Weather
by Atheniandream
Summary: *NOW BETA'D* Based on a Prompt for Darveyfics on Tumblr. Harvey has to return the favour to Donna. Post 7.10
1. Chapter 1

_**.**_

 _ **Weather**_

 _ **By Atheniandream**_

 _._

He had been trying to find her, for something. He can't remember what that something was, now. _A stray file, maybe._ The last page of a document for a merger, perhaps. Something that he'd needed another signature on, and she'd taken, _to verify_ , only to not give it back when the shit had hit the fan, after _yet another_ squabble filled with unimportant words to cover things that they were both too afraid to say to one another.

She wasn't answering her phone, when he'd tried to call about it. He couldn't work out if she was screening his calls in particular, or if she was out to a late and over running lunch. He never knew where she was anymore, and after the fourth month of her not being his secretary, added together with their string of now famous fights, it was starting to distress him, _quietly and slowly_.

 _She always let him know before. They used to be within one another's orbit almost constantly..._

 _They were in a strange place right now._ He was so angry at her. And yet, despite that, he didn't feel welcome in her company, either. _Especially in her office._ It had become a fortress against him, which considering the close proximity was hard to take. He'd spent an entire decade being able to walk in and out of her cubicle without a word, and now he was reduced to knocking. To weighing up the legitimacy of him entering her personal space with or without her there.

He had walked in, carefully glancing over documents that lay spread out on her desk. _Fanned,_ like she used to do for _him._ He felt the pinch of regret in the space between his lungs at the sight of such a thing.

 _She had gotten him a secretary, recently._ He had been too annoyed with her, still, to comment at the time. To even say thank you.

It was the last remaining strand between them. Cut swiftly, by _her_ hand.

He had found himself lingering on little items on her desk. Flowers, and a stapler with an engraved 'D.P' on it - _no doubt a ridiculous gift from Louis, when she'd acquired the space, a 'welcome to your own office' gift of over-the-top proportions_ \- before his eyes caught at one of the drawers, slightly open.

 _He's not a snoop._ He would never be, but the contents of said drawer shook at his mind for a second, so he leant back, and with one index finger, and pulled the drawer open on its runners.

It sat there, silver and battered and bruised. _Like their relationship._

They hadn't used it once...since he'd told her about _Paula_.

And he hadn't wanted to ask because it hadn't felt right. Especially after the key. And then she had stopped offering it before trial.

 _Everything seemed broken now. Off kilter. Topsy Turvy_...

"Mr Specter?"

He glances up in a second, his body straightening, like a boy who'd just been caught, until the familiar face of his rather young Assistant, Julie, sharpens his features.

"Someone's on the line for Ms Paulsen?" She says, looking at him for direction.

"Have you _called_ her?" He asks, hoping to understand if she's taking calls or not. _And who exactly is on the 'accept call' list.._

"Yes. _No answer._ I'm afraid it's urgent." She explains, her face worried.

"Just uh...leave a message." He says flippantly, waving his hand at her.

"Actually, _Sir_ , they're insisting that they talk to someone. now." She replies, her face unsure.

He groans, walking back around Donna's desk.

"Patch them through and I'll take it here." He sighs.

His assistant nods, disappearing back to her newly assigned desk.

He pulls out the chair of her desk, feeling like he's betraying the sanctity of her space as he sits down there.

Her chair is different to his. _It's softer._ There's not the support there like there is with his. His mind wanders oddly for a second, before he picks up the phone, noticing the red rectangle flashing at him, and presses the button beside it, connecting the call and placing it to his ear.

"Harvey Specter here. Donna's out at the moment. _What is it_?" He says, his hand tapping on the desk.

He listens on the other end, his mind halting with each word that's said.

"I'll...I'll find her. I'll...get her to call you." He stutters, his voice a mere ghost of what it was before.

He places the receiver down, noticing his own breath catch in his chest with a lumpiness.

" **Harvey** ,"

His eyes dart up, to witness orange and peach and and pale pink, as two large and seemingly light brown eyes bore into his with an annoyance at his presence in her office.

It if weren't for the words floating about in his head this would be an _entirely_ different encounter.

All of his frustration at her is stripped away, replaced with an entirely new emotion.

She narrows her eyes, her own slightly ornery demeanour dissipating into the air between them as she notices the difference in him. "Harvey, what is it?" She says, alarm in her voice.

He stands up, in one fluid motion, his eyes feeling glassier than they should for someone that he held complete contempt for.

"I uh...Donna...I'm _so_ sorry." He says, stepping towards her.

She frowns, noticing his sudden closeness and how alien it has become, of late. "Harvey, tell me what's going on?" She orders.

"Your Dad... _he, uh_..." He swallows, his face charting a hundred words.

She steps back, catching almost every one.

"No..." She says, her face bending immediately with the pressure of everything he's not saying but inferring all too well. Her bottom lip trembles, her hands hanging limp by her sides.

"How did it..." She asks, before the threat of the truth is too much. "No." She says, snatching the word. "I don't want to know...I," She bends, a wave of panic making her shoulders turn in as she slumps, a cry falling out of her. "Oh my god." She whispers, looking about herself.

It breaks him, watching his own life in reverse, the emotion pour like liquid all over her pale face. He strides towards her, folding her into him without a second thought. She stiffens, before he feels her mouth, silent of sound and yet grimacing against his neck.

It feels strange, and for a moment his head is screaming at the contact and yet his mind feels lost, out of body, as she racks with sobs, his wider arms holding her steady on those enormous heels of hers.

He feels himself on autopilot, his hands rubbing at the middle of her back when she finally grips the fabric of his suit as it hangs down his back, her breath thready in his embrace as she tries to stop the freefall of salt ridden tears.

"I'm _**so sorry**_ Donna," He repeats, his voice softer then, and feeling almost mute in such a moment.

With _his Father_ , they never touched once. They never so much as hugged. But she stood there with him, silently as he faced the wall, his eyes blurring into vinyl with every painfully gulped breath. She didn't leave until he was done, _and he owed her the same_ , at the very least.

His right hand slides up into her hair, sliding against the back of her head for a moment, before he checks himself, and drops it, a question of where the impulse even came from in the first place drumming into his mind.

She straightens, leaning away from him, an awkwardness at the black smudges that have appeared around her eyes, as she wipes at her cheeks with the side of each index finger. He stands there, unsure of what to do.

"I need to... _tell my Mom_...I need to...wait, _who called_?" She suddenly asks.

"Your Uncle... _Joseph_ , I think?" He recollects.

She nods, the name familiar to her, as she runs at hand through her coral tinged hair.

"I need to... _take the day_. I need to..." She slides past him then, her eyes directing themselves to her bag.

"I'll call Ray," He says.

She slides her bag over her shoulder, her expression vague. "Thank you, Harvey."

He nods then, watching her walk away from him, on autopilot.

. .

He realises something, in the moment between her leaving and the inhale of breath.

 _He needs to be there for her._

He wants her to need him, in this moment.

He doesn't know where to start.

 _And that is the thing that catches at him the most..._

. .

She's been gone all weekend. Paula has noticed, _that sense of distraction in him_. That when Monday morning comes, his tie is dark blue, all of a sudden. She's starting to pick up on things that Donna knew _long_ ago. After everything that's happened, there's no space for the truth anymore. He can't tell her what's occupying him. It would cause another argument. And he can't handle that right now.

 _On Monday, when he enters the office, she's still not back._

He asks Rachel how Donna is doing, knowing that they'll have most likely been in touch several times. She gives him a guarded expression - still not happy with him, but never giving up the fact - and explains that the funeral is on Wednesday.

He nods, and spends Monday night pushing things around with a fork, as Paula tries to encourage casual conversation.

He realises, for the first time in his life, that the place Donna used to occupy within his life, is taken now. There are certain things that he can't do with her anymore. Certain things that are no longer _her_ job. And it has _nothing_ to do with her _not being his Assistant anymore_ …

.

He comes out with the words on Tuesday night, in his apartment, as if he's been gearing himself up for three days without realising.

" **I can't do this with you**." He says, suddenly.

Her light blue eyes blink against the words, her face scrutinising his.

"Can't do what? _What's going on_?" She asks, leaning back into the sofa.

He decides to tell her the truth.

"Donna's Dad died. I... _hated the guy_...but _she_ was there for me when _my_ Dad died. And I need to be there for her." He tells her.

"Why?" She narrows her eyes. "Surely she has someone who can do that, Harvey. _It's not your responsibility to be her emotional crutch_ , no matter _how much_ you care for her."

"Paula, this is a non-negotiable." He argues.

"Well...I'm sorry Harvey, but I don't like the idea of my boyfriend going to comfort a woman that outright kissed him!"

"Paula," He says, trying to discourage her.

"You're unbelievable! It's like you can't see the truth, when it comes to her." She says, examining him.

"Paula, _it's not like that_ , Donna and I, have been in eachother's lives for _well over_ a decade."

"Yes. Well. I'm starting wonder why. Maybe it has nothing to do with her. Maybe it's all down to you." She accuses. "Maybe it's always been that way?"

"What?" He narrows his eyes then, a weird feeling stirring in his gut.

She stands up then, seeming to need the space. Either that or the advantage of height.

"Are you in love with her, Harvey?" She fires at him. "Are you _in love_ with Donna?"

He swallows, feeling cornered in an instant. "No."

"I'm sorry, but I don't believe you." She says, a bitter laugh falling out.

"Paula," He says her name like a warning, his arms flapping. " _What do you want me to say_?"

"I don't want you to stay anything to me right now." She says, her face sharpening as she turns away from him. She doubles back on herself. "Look," She says, her head shaking slightly. "Do us _both_ a favour, and figure out how you feel about her. Because I can't be in this relationship, watching how she affects you the way that she does."

She walks away from him then, disappearing down the hallway.

He hears the door slam soon after.

He doesn't run after her.

He wonders if, in some sardonic way, he's planned her exit.

If he's planned the entire thing, all along.

.

 _We fought our fights in silence_

 _But the war's not done_

 _No ground was gained_

 _But the fear from our past howls in the wind_

 _It's a foolish and a dangerous endeavor_

 _It's a cut against the grain_

 _It is not wise to go against the weather_

 _Just to get caught out in the rain_

 _And through it all_

 _Your words remain_

 _Like teardrops in a hurricane_

 _'Hurricane' by Jordan McKampna_

.

He packs a bag, picks a black suit and books out a dark blue 1971 Plymouth Hemi Barracuda from the Car Club. It's a two hour drive, and it's already ten, but he needs the time to think, to process his conversation with Paula anyway. Ray had text him with the address of where Donna had been dropped off, and confirmed that it was her Father's place in Hartford, Connecticut.

 _It serves as his final destination of the night._ He figures if she wasn't there, then he'll get a Motel, and look for her in the morning.

The weather is cold on the drive up there, as he turns up the A/C on the dashboard, the sound of smooth jazz playing in the background.

His life is a mess, and yet he's never felt calmer. _He always did_ , when he had a clear objective in his mind. It helped direct the frustration in him. _Something to focus on. Something to work towards_.

She'd only featured _twice_ in his life, in that regard.

 _The first_ , when he had asked her to come to the firm with him.

And the second, was to get her back, _after Jessica had boldly fired her ass for a memo that she'd never even seen before, but had acted impulsively against_.

When it comes to him, Donna is impulsive. He has learnt that now, since she had kissed him.

 _And he had kissed her back._ He was _well aware_ of it, after a time. _So was she, it seems._

It had been everything else _after that,_ that had ruined them…

He arrives quicker than he had expected he would, a direct result of his foot pressing firmly down on the accelerator most of the way there.

He pulls up to a humble looking family-sized home. A strange size for a single man with no immediate family close-by. _It occurs to Harvey that perhaps the man had always been trying to claw back everything he once lost._ He observes it's white furnishings, and a large porch gleaming in the lamplight. It's homely, for a house with no future. It's a morbid thought, but there it is.

 _It's almost twelve._ But the lights are still on, he notes.

He pushes the car door too, leaving his suitcase for the moment. He climbs the stairs, coming face to face with a door decorated with lead and coloured glass. He knocks, inhaling a tired breath at his very long day.

He adjusts his footing when a mottled figure of orange, white and tan grows closer to the door.

The door opens, as his eyes find hers.

"Harvey," She says, her shocked face bending into a frown.

"Hey." He says, biting his lip.

"What are you doing here?" She asks, her trademark dryness as she observes him.

"I'm...being there _for you_. Just like you did for me." He says.

"I never went to your Dad's funeral, Harvey."

"Well, m _aybe you should have_."

 _He means it. His Father had loved Donna Paulsen._

Her expression falters then, her hand sliding down the door's edge.

"You gonna let me in, or what?" He infers, feeling left out on a limb.

She gives him a strange expression, before leaving the door open.

 _If her Dad hadn't just died, he wouldn't be here_ , he tells himself.

 _The legitimacy of that statement doesn't linger long._

He shuts the door behind himself, before following her down a long white hall, the usual middle America decor popping out at him in pictures of the countryside, and a framed flag. He wonders if James Paulsen was a war-reenactment fanatic, as he observes little trinkets here and there.

He wanders into a large kitchen, spotting Donna in the corner, her finger flicking a kettle on as he smells the faint over-roasted smell of coffee, coming from a percolator in the corner. He gravitates to a nearby bar stool on a counter in the middle of the room. Her hair is now in a loose bun atop her head, and her cream and tan cardigan is wrapped around her thin frame. She's heelless, and smaller and for a moment he wonders how long it's been since he's seen her like that, without her laid in his office, or holding onto a door frame with a notable expression. She's oddly quiet. No doubt, still angry at him, and shattered from the news about her Father.

He watches her pick up the coffee jug, pouring what he assumes is _his_ coffee, and wanders over to him, then, placing the coffee down in front of him, her hands folding neatly, if not slightly defensively across her chest. He notices her stand on one leg, like a yoga instructor, her lifted foot spreading against her other calf.

"Does Paula know that you're here?" She asks, her tone of voice serious, her eyes finding his for a moment.

He nods, chewing on his lip. "Yes." He manages.

She nods once, before the click of the kettle has her wandering over to the remaining cup, pouring hot water on what he smells as something fruity and sweet. She wanders back over to him, staying on the opposite side of the counter as she places her cup down, holding her hands around it for warmth.

"How's it going?" He asks her.

"Everythings...finalised." She says slowly. "Tombstone. Oak Coffin. Next to his oldest Brother." She states.

"How are you doing?" He asks her then, his face tilting to look at her.

" _I just_ …" She pauses, sighing, her jaw cranking to the side as if the thought itself is just too potent to consider. "I realised...I barely saw him. Over the years."

"I'm sorry." He says, the sentiment automatic.

"I just... **I never made the time**." She shrugs.

"I know that feeling... _all too well_." He agrees, sipping his coffee.

" _I just_ ," She breathes...

"What?"

"Nothing." She decides, shaking her head.

"Donna," He presses gently, her name just the right pressure point to encourage the words out of her.

"He's never gonna see me get married, Harvey. _Or have kids_. Or be there for me…to _help out_."

He's been thinking. Lately. _About his Brother, and his family, and everything that his brother has that he doesn't._ The guy has his own restaurant, and a family, and kids, and yet...he has...a firm. And a complicated history with a woman that he's not even seeing. And a girlfriend...maybe.

"Donna," He says, noticing the way her face bends with pressure, to keep in the feelings she obviously hasn't exorcised yet.

"I've done _nothing_ with my life, Harvey! And now there's no time to make up for that. He's not...gonna be a part of my life, anymore." She cries. "He's not going to be _there_...for any of it." She manages with a gasp.

He springs off of the barstool in the frame of a second, sliding around the counter towards her, pulling her roughly into his chest.

 _Seeing her cry is the one thing in the entire world that brings out a reaction in him._

She's too tried, it seems, to even object against the action of his embrace, as her arms fold around his sides, her hands pressing around the back of his lungs. At her real height, she's about four or so inches shorter than him, as he bends around her. Her head slides against the right side of his chest, as he folds her closer into him, her tears soaking the collar of his blue sweater.

He sighs, deeply, as his right hand smoothes up and down her back, feeling her breath catch in the pulsing waves of an almost sob. He slides his other hand across the right side of her face, his thumb wiping the moisture away, and tickling the wispy hairs of her hairline.

"You lived your life, Donna. And he lived his." He tells. "It's all you can do."

She pulls away then, a frustration scoring out of her. "You don't understand Harvey. I should have _done_ those things, so that he could be a part of them. I had a chance to do them and I didn't, _and now_...I missed the chance to have those memories. Even after he's gone."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm saying that I should have said yes! To the one person who asked." She says, exasperated.

"What are you,"

"Mark Meadows? My Ex? He's...married now. _Unhappily_. He wanted for us to have...an affair. Something I would never, _ever_ , have considered before." She says. "But he wanted to be with me, over a decade ago. He wanted to marry me and have kids with me, and _he still does now_ , and if I'd have said yes, back then, then my Father wouldn't have had to miss ANY of it. His memory would have lived on in my children, and _my_ life, and..."

"Donna," He swallows thickly, his mouth feeling dry all of a sudden.

"But instead, I'm standing here, with nothing to show for it, and my Father's gone before I could even consider anything."

"Donna. _Look_...it doesn't matter what you do. Losing a parent is _hard_. But if this guy won't leave his wife for you, then it either means that he's too much of coward, or that you did the right thing back then,"

"You really think that you should be lecturing people on _not_ being a coward?" She fires at him, her intention soft in the space between them.

"Dammit Donna, why do you think I'm here!?" He says, his voice raising in pitch.

"I don't know, Harvey? I don't understand anything you do anymore." She says, her tone cutting as she shuts down the conversation, moving past him then.

"Donna," He objects, his voice raising with the distance that she makes.

"Can we just... _not_ talk about 'Us' tonight? I have to bury my father in the morning." She reminds him.

He nods then. _It makes sense_ , he thinks, as he looks to his watch. _It's almost 1am. And he didn't come here for to fight_.

He hears the stairs creak, immediately following her.

When he reaches the top of the landing, he notices a light on, his feet following it like a moth to a flame.

His head rounds the corner, noticing her fluff the pillows on a large bed, two towels at the end. "You can sleep in here." She says, giving him a tired look. She moves towards him, before pausing. "Did you bring a suit?" She asks, limply.

"In the car." He nods, his lips twisting.

She nods. "I'll see you in the morning." She tells him, her face unreadable, as she starts to move past him. His hand catches at hers, as his fingers close around his own.

"I'm right here, if you need _anything_. Okay?" He says, his chin lowering to make sure she looks him in the eye.

She nods, seeming to relax for the first time since he's arrived. "Goodnight, Harvey." She says, her hand sliding out of his.

He sees freckles in negative, as she walks away.

He wants to go to her, still, even as he lies in a stranger's bed.

 _He's not sure what to do with that, just yet._

.

 _The shadows appear and linger behind us_

 _From the raging sun_

 _No words exchanged as we speak from our hearts, and hold back the tears_

 _But it's a foolish and a dangerous endeavor_

 _It's a cut against the grain_

 _It is not wise to go against the weather_

 _Just to get caught out in the rain_

 _And through it all_

 _Your words remain_

 _Like teardrops in a hurricane_

 _Like teardrops in a hurricane_

 _Teardrops, teardrops, teardrops in a hurricane_

 _._


	2. Chapter 2

**_Chapter 2. (Beat'd)_**

 _._

The light is glaring, and grey tinged, as he wakes up to the folding of the night. He rolls over, his right shoulder giving him some resistance, in a crack and several pops. He had brought his overnight bag from the car, before finally succumbing to the need for sleep, as he now witnesses the action in his suit, staring at him from the back of the door and his suitcase resting near an old wardrobe.

He stretches, moving his neck to warm it slightly against the coolness in the room.

He pulls on a pair of slacks that he'd laid out the night before, and an old sweater, before wandering into the en suite, the toilet bowl calling as part of his morning routine. He washes his hands after, his reflection catching in the mirror. _He looks tired. He looks like he needs a vacation._ _There was nothing worse than taking time out from work and it **not** being a relaxing experience._ He sighs against the slightly selfish thought. He is here for Donna's benefit, and that is enough to temper his underlying frustrations.

He opens the door to his room, noticing that all the other doors in the hall are closed. He wonders if she's still asleep. _Maybe she was too pre-occupied to sleep. He's been like that_ , tossing and turning all night until the sun rises, and then suddenly falling asleep to the golden hour of the morning twilight.

He pads downstairs, into the kitchen, the only room that he had been shown the night before.

 _She's not here._ He wonders if she's out, or else asleep still.

Either way, he's starving, having not eaten much the night before, and then having driven an adequate amount, only to drink coffee when he finally arrived. By now, his stomach is lashing with a sear, and crying out for food. He pauses, realising that coffee is still a dead cert, and goes about finding the certain things he needs. Two cupboards and three draws later, and he's loaded a fresh jug of coffee into the percolator, and is now staring into the fridge.

 _He needs protein, and carbohydrate, in that order._

He figures, that given her current state, and the situation at hand, she wouldn't mind him knocking up a little something.

He knows that Donna is an _only child_. Unlike him, she doesn't have siblings to pick up the slack, making it all the more important, _that if Mike and Rachel weren't here_ , that someone should be, at the very list.

And so, _it's him_.

 _Maybe they had_ _also_ _assumed it would be him_ , he thinks idly, as his hands pop a carton of eggs on the countertop and he goes in search of the mere insinuation of some sort of bread.

He's not sure if some may have been here from her Father, or if she picked some up. It occurs to him that he has no idea what she eats when they don't go out to dinner. He assumes she wouldn't want to eat out, especially if she's not up yet.

He thinks he's scored big, when he opens the tiny freezer to find some toasted muffins, and suddenly his mind is on an end game. _Some butter, and some ketchup and a coffee, and you have a mildly healthier Egg Mcmuffin_. It's then, that bacon starts to flit into his mind, and all at once the opportunity to up the anty is an _all too attractive a course of action_.

He finds linked sausages, but figures that going all out is not really in spirit of the day. Donna's never been able to eat much when she's nervous, so given that she has to do the unthinkable today, he prepares himself for some resistance.

He feels odd, and yet oddly at ease here, fixing things in the kitchen of a man he freely disliked.

 _Jim Paulsen and Harvey Specter never got on_. _And never would, it seems._

However, Harvey has absolutely no guilt, whatsoever, at the thought of such a thing.

In his mind, the man never once looked after Donna. _Not as he should have_. He never protected her, or provided for her, as he should have. And that is just one step of bad parenting too far, for Harvey Specter. Add to that, putting her in jeopardy, several times over the course of them working together, and it left a very bad taste in his mouth.

He was only sad for the loss that _she_ would feel. _Today. Tomorrow._ A Year from now.

 _Donna Paulsen had loved her father, regardless._ Because she was loyal, almost to a fault.

" _Are you cooking_?" Says a familiar, if not humour filled voice behind him.

He freezes on the spot, before turning around to witness her looking at him, a note of intrigue on her fresh looking face, suddenly covered in caramel freckles. He's never seen her like that, with a towel around her head and dressed down with a casualness about her. He has to check himself, the sight of her distracting him from the small omelettes that are frying in a pan, and the muffins that are defrosting, slowly under the low setting of the grill.

"Believe it or not, I _do actually cook_ , Donna." He tells her, before his attention focuses between the grill and the stove.

"I...didn't know that about you." She says, walking over to him.

"I mean, nothing... _foodie_ , or anything." He adds. "Eggs?" He asks, looking to her.

"I uh…" She pauses, reticent, and not, _it seems,_ because of his cooking.

"Donna. You need to eat something." He says, delicately skirting around the main feature of the day. "There's coffee, by the way." He points out, before adding a little more pepper and salt to the eggs.

He glances at her, as she wanders over to the coffee pot, picking up a mug hanging on a mug tree nearby, and pours one out for herself.

"You need a refill?" He hears her ask. He glances back at her, watching her chin jut to the cup alongside him.

 _If he has any more coffee he'll end up with an ulcer,_ he thinks to himself, before turning down the eggs, and reaching towards the grill.

"No. I'm good, thanks." He says, flipping the eggs. "Did you get any sleep?" He asks her.

"A little...I have _a lot_ to do today." She sighs. "I have the florists coming here at ten, and the caterer at eleven." She explains.

He notices her gravitate next to him, as he turns off the eggs, placing the frying pan on marble chopping board.

"You need me to do anything?" He asks, half occupied on the grill.

" _Plough me with wine at the wake_?" She offers, a smirk ready for him when he looks at her.

"Why do you think I'm making you eggs?' He smirks back at her, pointing to the food in front of him. "Anything else?" He asks.

"Not really." She says. "I spent the past few days cleaning up a bit. Getting things ready, you know…" She shrugs.

He carries the bread swiftly to the marble counter. As he's dusting the crumbs off of his hands, and reaches for the butter - that he placed next to him before he started - he witnesses two plates slide onto the countertop.

 _She always could second guess him._

They are a well oiled machine in any situation. No matter the task, they always seem to be able to navigate it together without so much as a word.

He resists the urge to smirk, when she pops the ketchup bottle next to him.

He starts to assemble the muffins, placing two pieces on each plate, before loading them with the mini omelettes. He picks up the glass ketchup bottle then, giving it a hefty shake, before undoing the top and tapping the end to witness a blob slip out of the end, and then a second.

He places the breaded lids on top of each, watching the butter as it runs across the outside of the sandwich, a satisfied smirk on his face. "Dining Room?" He enquires, watching as she walks to him, plucking a plate from his hand.

The dining room is light and airy, different from the rest of the house. He wonders if the man ever used it, having never really had a family in his later years. It's a sad thought.

He let's her sit first, watching her take the head position - no doubt her Father's seat - and sits on the seat left of that, just on the corner.

He places his plate and cup down, and takes a seat.

 _He wants to ask her about her Father. If she knew of this place. If she spent time here._ But it wouldn't be right. She was grieving and maybe not even in that place yet. Hell, he'd avoided it for weeks. _Trust Donna to get a funeral arranged in under a week_. She always could make the impossible possible.

He picks up his muffin, his stomach growling with an insistence, as he takes a bite. It's then that he hears her moan slightly.

His eyes flick to hers, to witness her rather comically chewing with a look of almost ecstasy on her face. "You okay, over there?" He asks, entertained with the look on her face.

"Oh my god. This is _amazing._..it's just eggs...what did you do to it?" She asks, in disbelief.

"Just whipped, by my very own hand." He brags, not an ounce of pride left out.

"God, it's so good I could screw it, marry it, divorce it, and then re-marry it just to screw it again..." She remarks, a touch of Louis about her as she licks the fingers on one hand.

He splutters, spitting a piece of egg across the table in a laugh, causing her eyes to go wide, as she witnesses a piece of egg in the middle of the table.

It's the first time she's seemed like herself since he arrived.

Their eyes meet, and suddenly they are laughing, like teenagers, in between him banging his chest, and her licking her fingers. He coughs slightly to dislodge the chaos in his mouth, before placing his muffin on his plate, as he picks up his coffee, taking a large sip.

" _Please don't choke_." She says. "If you die too, I'm just gonna leave you there, as an act of protest." She warns, the awkward edge not lost on them both.

" _I'm not going anywhere_." He says, an all too natural reaction to her words.

She gives him a look that makes him regret the words instantly, before he checks himself.

Suddenly he's not so afraid to make the statement a point of fact.

" _I mean it_ , Donna." He tells her.

She nods then. "Thanks for being here, Harvey." She says, her lips bending into a guarded smile that encourages a mirrored expression in him.

They both settle then, against the starkness of today's heavy subject matter, continuing on their muffins and coffee in a somewhat perfect silence.

.

By eleven, the entire house is filled with flower arrangements, on twisted mahogany stands, a mixture of lilac and sun burnt orange.

 _It would seem an odd choice, if you described them badly, but in the flesh they are rather beautiful_ , he decides. Donna had explained, before they arrived, that she had chosen the same to be placed on his coffin, and at the service.

He helps the caterer carry in food for the upcoming wake, watching as it fills up the large kitchen, with some dry items being placed on the dining table. He smiles evenly, noticing the slightly yellow stain, from his earlier 'infraction' at breakfast as he covers the stain with a platter.

 _It's almost an hour till the car arrives_ , he thinks to himself, as he walks upstairs, wandering to the guest room.

He looks out the window, noticing that the sky has not changed since the early morning. The day hangs limply with a sad undertone. He supposes that it's fitting, in some ways. _Nobody wants the sun to shine on the loss of a person_ ; not unless it's _the peek of shimmering sunrays through moody clouds, as their loved one is ceremoniously lowered into the ground_.

He turns, the thumb on his right hand pressing the last handcuff through a buttonhole, before he regards himself in the long dress mirror beside him.

He has a flash of a memory, of dressing for his own Father's funeral. Today is different, but all at once the same. He stretches to the bed, snatching the black tie that he had laid out moments before, and slides it around his neck. He looks at it, before a thought occurs. It's the first time he's thought this, and the first time he's able to exorcise the right.

He lets go of the tie, leaving it limp, as he walks to the door, opening it. He halts when his eyes collide with two hazel orbs, a little higher than they've been before. He swallows, his eyes flicking down to black Manolos and bare legs, gradually rising up at the sight of a black sheath dress, demure and elegant, with a laced detail over the shoulders and chest.

Her hair is wavy, and her face is made up. _Her freckles disguised with a peachiness_.

"Hey, can you help me with the clasp on this zip?" She asks. "It keeps...catching in my hair." She explains, her expression guarded again.

"Sure," He agrees, his tone lighter than hers, stepping to the side and allowing her into the room, as she turns around for him. He walks towards her, watching as she twists her hair in her hands and pulls it over her shoulder, allowing him to bend forward and hook the two clasps together.

She turns around to face him, a slight frown above a grateful expression. "Thanks." She says, before her face turns a self-conscious. "How do I look? Good enough to bury my Father?" She half jokes.

His head tilts at her rather blunt question. _She never was one for sugar coating_. "You look...beautiful." He tells her.

Her eyes widen at his words, and he feels the unease at their situation. "Seeing as you're here, you may as well," He says, immediately changing the subject, and inferring his tie with a faked annoyance.

Her head tilts for a moment, giving him a look.

" _You're only gonna fix it anyway_." He accuses softly, a twisted smirk appearing on his face, that she copies, in her own cat-like fashion. It folds into a reservedness, but she steps towards him anyway, her hand expertly flying into the creation of a windsor knot. He focuses on her eyes, and their level concentration. With heels on, her gaze is just above the arch of his cheekbone. It's not lost on him, that he's starting to keep a finite attention on her proximity to him. _Height, distance and gaze._ They've all become strange factors in their situation, _since that night_. _And he's been playing against every single one._

He frowns, moving his weight onto the other foot, as he watches her maroon nails work against the black silk and the cotton of his shirt.

He realises, that except for last night, she's not been this close to him _since_ she kissed him. He had spent the past few weeks distancing himself from this kind of closeness.

And it isn't as though that what Paula had said to him, makes it any easier to endure. If anything, it should make him more reticent.

 _His girlfriend doesn't like the connection that he and Donna share. Fact._

He realises then, his eyes roaming about her face, his lips absent-mindedly moving against the tip of his tongue to moisten them, that he is like a moth to a flame, where she is concerned. He reciprocates _everything_ that she gives him. But only that. He feels like a stiff reaction to her actions, in the way that she reacts to his decisions at work. He is so rooted in her leading the personal, and him leading the professional, that perhaps, that's why he's so at a loss with her.

 _In the professional, he leads in strides and they accomplish._

In the personal, she withholds, and pulls them back, and they remain measured.

The truth is, they're never gonna change unless _he_ changes them.

She tried, and he bailed. _Fact._

So now it's his job...to equalise them.

Same, _as they can only fail, if she's not with him to help him take the prize_.

"There. _Perfect_." She resolves, picking up his jacket to hand to him.

"Thanks," He says, feeding one arm through his Tom Ford suit jacket, before it levels out in the other arm.

Her eyes linger for a second, as he straightens it at each wrist.

"The car's gonna arrive soon," She tells him.

"Okay." He says, watching her slide out of the doorway and down the stairs.

.

 _Whilst you were sleeping  
I sat in the dark  
With all my offenses  
The creases on my heart  
And all these bad feelings  
From my teenage boy brain  
And for all of my offenses  
I will count the grains of salt, salt_

' ** _Salt_** ' By Jordan McKampna

.

Donna hadn't called any immediate family to join her in the funeral car.

Turns out, _her Mother_ wouldn't be there until the funeral itself. _She obviously still had unresolved feeling about her ex-husband._ He's caught between annoyance at the fact, and a tempered understanding of the woman's past.

Harvey's glad that he came, now. He couldn't bare the thought of her going it alone. Suddenly, he's disgusted with the amount of pressure that Donna has had to endure alone.

He watches her falter when she sees the black hearse, the beautiful arrangement draped over the wooden panelled coffin. He feels a panic in him, and takes her hand, squeezing just to distract her from folding completely. Her hand hangs limply in his, until her left hand grasps the arm that keeps their hands joined, her face bending slightly before she lets go.

The car slides towards them, and he watches her double take, before glancing at him.

He feels a smirk bending into his lips, as they both watch the passenger window slide down, and the familiar face of a man that's been in their lives for so long.

"Ray?" She blinks, frowning slightly in disbelief. Harvey's driver smirks back at her, before looking to his boss, nodding in respect. "Harvey,"

"Morning Ray," He greets, winking to his driver.

Donna looks to him, her face reading a gambit of emotions, every one of them hanging on a question.

"Thought you could use a familiar face." He reasons.

She smiles tiredly, squeezing his hand as he opens the door for her, and she climbs inside the car.

She slides across the black interior, as he follows, shutting the car door. The window partition is rolled down, and he watches Ray wink at her from the driver's seat before the partition rises again. He mentally thanks Ray. _Donna's not going to want to focus on the image of her father, in a coffin no less than twelve feet away._ She looks to him then, her expression full and slightly watery.

"Thankyou Harvey."

"You're welcome." He says.

He hears her sift a heavy breath through her lungs, that his own breath measures, their gazes drifting as the car follows behind in a procession-like fashion.

.

It's not long before they reach the Zion Hill Cemetery, in the middle of Hartford, a large expanse of a plot, edged by large trees. It's more spread out, and flat, but nothing like the packed in Cemetery where his own Father is buried.

There are a wealth of cars, and people walking in the direction that the hearse travels. No doubt, some from Cortland, _her place of birth_ , and even New York and the local Hartford area.

 _It turns out that, Jim Paulsen was well liked, despite his desperate streak,_ he thinks, as he watches people take note of the town car.

He opens the door, watching Donna slide out beside him, as he shuts the door, giving the black frame a gentle knock of thanks, as Ray drives away to park.

Donna is visibly shaken, people milling past her, as her eyes scour the drove of people.

He frowns slightly, his hand sliding around hers in the vain hope that it will calm her.

She flinches, giving him a slightly distressed look, as her hand moves away. "Harvey... _people are gonna think_ …" She says off the bat.

He blinks, looking about them. "Who cares what people think?" He counters.

" _ **I do**_." She says harshly, a look of disbelief on her face before straightening then, as a woman catches her eye, and she walks ahead.

 _He doesn't understand her. All he wants to do is give her comfort in a moment where she needs it the most._

He follows her, feeling like an ass as his phone buzzes in his pocket. He fishes out his phone, noticing the Caller ID.

"Hey Mike Everything okay?" He says, sighing at the interruption.

" _I was about to ask you the same thing_ ," He hears his friend say. "How's Donna?"

"She's... _dealing_." He says, stifling the urge to tell his best friend the truth. "You and Louis haven't burnt down the firm yet, I take it?" He jokes harshly.

" _ **As if**_...everything runs like clockwork when your lame ass isn't around." Mike says in a disparaging tone.

"Asshole." He chastens in reply, smirking at the banter. _It's needed at this point._

"Just... _look after Donna_." Mike tells him.

"I'm…" He pauses, sighing heavily. " _Trying_ …"

"Well... ** _try harder_**." His friend encourages. "We all send her our love." His friend adds, before he can comment. _He's a smart one, is Mike Ross_. _He still hasn't forgiven him for going Donna in the first place..._

" **I will**." He says, ending the call.

He feels lighter after the call.

 _Best friends can do that_ , he realises.

He sighs, then, re-focusing himself. _It's not personal_ , her behaviour...and _he is still seeing someone else._ And right now, she doesn't know any different. And Her father had just died. Leaving her almost alone in the world.

 _But she wasn't alone._

 _She had **him**._

 _And she needs to know that._

He follows loosely behind her, allowing her to talk with people he doesn't know and watch as she tries to put on a brave face.

She had explained, earlier in the day, that her cousins, sons of her Aunt were to be Pallbearers. That her Aunt Joan, had pretty much helped with things over the phone, and for all intents and purposes, been her guiding light throughout it all.

When they arrive at the ceremony, she's left him a seat next to her. As he sits down, their eyes collide. He notices hers, large and kohl rimmed are filled with tears, almost to the very brim. He frowns, not taking his eyes off her for a second. A silent pledge to her, that he wasn't going anywhere. That he'd be right here. She nods, sniffing as her shoulders twitched with an effort.

He looks around for a moment, observing the coffin as it is placed down onto the ramp. The site, an open space is decorated with the same flowers as the house, and a picture of Jim Paulsen, grizzly haired with eyes that look like the male version of the woman's sat next to him.

His mind falters over the Priest's words and sentiment, about the kind of man that James Paulsen was. He couldn't speculate on his entire character. He knew his essence, and that had been enough for him.

He watches an older woman, with red hair and light coloured eyes make her way to the small white pulpit, having missed the Priest's introduction.

She looks to Donna, who blinks, her eyes connecting with the woman on the pulpit.

"Good Afternoon everyone, I'm Joan." the woman says. "You may or may not know me, as Jim's sister." She regards the room. " _Donna_ , Jim's wonderful daughter, asked, if I could say a few words about her Father, _my brother_." She explains.

His attention slips out again, as he notices Donna falter, collecting the stories her Aunt describes to the congregation, as her face bends and she mashes her lips together, her breath hitching once more, to keep the flood of tears at bay. He grabs her hand, as her eyes flick to him. He wonders if she's going to make a slight scene, but something in her eyes has her stalling, until she finally gives in, and her right fingers slip in between his left ones. Her hand is cool against his warm one, and her mouth bends up at the corner, before she moves her attention back to her Aunt's words.

He finds himself chuckling at things the charming woman says, in hearing Donna titter next to him, delighting the congregation in another story of the more playful side of James Paulsen. For a moment he reminds him of Donna, in her youth. _Devilish and always trying to push the envelope for effect._

The time comes for them to stand, as he squeezes her hand, pulling them slightly together, as they watch the casket get lowered.

Donna had decided not to have the mourners gather around the coffin, the action slightly morbid considering the guy was going into the ground. He notices her clench his hand, as her Father's coffin draws past ground level, lowering into his final resting place. His eyes flick to her, bending over slightly, her breath heaving as tears fall freely across her face. It tears him into pieces as he almost rips her to him, his hands wrapping around her, feeling the stutter of her breath that racks into a sob. His collar and neck are suddenly wet, her hands fitting around him as they had done almost twelve hours ago. He leans back and kisses her temple without so much as a thought, before she disconnects, wiping at her eyes. She leaves him, knowing that _this_ is the moment, as she walks to the grave, throwing a pile of dirt into the hole, as a last act of sacrifice and acceptance to lay her Father to rest.

She walks back to him, before his hand rests in hers once more. She squeezes it, a look of genuine thanks on her face as the funeral workers cover over her father's grave, and music plays in the background.

.

 _I cross the desert  
I cross the sky  
Look for you forever  
Wake up tonight  
Just around the corner  
Maybe tonight I'll find you_

 _Oh, some people fall  
Some people fall apart  
Some people fall while running in the dark  
Some people fall when they run out of luck  
Some people fall, some people fall in love_

' **Fall** ' By Cider Sky (Acoustic version)

.

As they reach the town car, a woman comes into view. Harvey remembers her instantly - _how can he not, the woman left a terrifyingly vivid imprint on his mind_. Half of fear and half of utter hilarity at his own actions. She is _much_ older now, her hair a little lighter brown than he'd remembers, but the same slightly lavish sense of dress. She looks like a character on Dynasty, with Donna's nose and mouth but slightly cat-like eyes. Her hair is still hair-sprayed to within an inch of his life, he notes, almost like a bike helmet, with half of it draping along one side. A man is with her, greyed haired and slightly more classic looking than the _dope_ that Donna had to attend to at her _god-awful dinner party_. The man examines him, and their joined hands, that separate instantly as she kisses her Mother on each cheek.

"Donna," The woman regards, her hands sliding to her daughters to examine her. "You look beautiful." She compliments, smiling warmly.

"Thanks Mom." She says with a smile, before the older man regards her.

"Donna...I'm so sorry for your loss." He says, a smoothness to his tone.

 _The guy looks like he's built upon the kind of money that her father had lost. With a slight Burt Reynolds vibe to him. It figures that her Mother would have met a man like him._

"Thankyou, Steven." Donna smiles limply. "I'm glad you're both here." She notes, before his eyes look square back at Harvey's. "Mom, you remember Harvey?"

"I do…" She smirks, something akin to Donna, as she nods in Harvey's general direction. "Harvey, good to see you. You've certainly _grown up_." She says, smirking in a way that borders between mothering and slightly predatory.

 _It's a strange statement, to say the least._ But it has been over a decade since he's seen her, so perhaps it's apt.

"Nice to see you again, Natalie." He says evenly, before turning to the man beside her, a hand stretching out with a confidence. "Hi, Harvey Specter," He regards cooly, to the man with only one name, as the man shakes his hand, exchanging pleasantries with a measured smile on his face. "Steven Rivers. _Nice to meet you, Harvey._ " He replies.

Both men nod as Donna seems to fidget then.

"How was the drive from Cortland?" She asks her Mother.

 ** _Her Mother had jumped back to her roots, jumping out of Hartford the moment she had dropped her husband._**

 ** _As far as Harvey knew, she never really saw her Mother that often, as a result of her leaving. It had splintered her family immeasurably._**

"Oh... _we flew_." Her Mother responds, looking towards Steven. "A far more efficient way to travel." She notes with a smile.

 _Clearly, he was her financial lifeline...and knew nothing about global warming risks..._

"Are you still coming to the wake, after?" Donna asks her Mother, her look rather expectant.

" _Of course, Darling_." She says, softly. " _He_ _ **was**_ _your Father_ , after all."

" _Mom_ ," She warns, feeling her Mother's swift slide into controversy.

Her Mother leans in, squeezing her arm. "I'll see you both there." She says, before tugging at the man next to her.

He watches Donna's face turn from affable to concerned.

He leans towards her, his tone hushed against her hair. "Who's the guy?"

" _ **Husband number four**_." She remarks with a distasteful frown.

 _It occurs to Harvey, that Donna's family life is even more fucked up than his seems to be._

.

Author's Note: Sorry Guys, it needed Beta'ing. Will get on the last two chapters tonight. A


	3. Chapter 3

**_Chapter 3. Beta'd_**

 ** _._**

Over an hour in, and Donna is fussing. And he, _in direct contrast,_ is trying to get _her_ drunk. Which isn't the easiest of tasks, when she's wound tighter than a dynamo. Following Donna about, whilst she fusses at things; **the music** \- _something nineteen forties, with a hint of old school jazz_ \- **_the food_** , - _brought out by the Caterer at appropriate intervals, a mixture of classic cuisines and fan favourites_ \- and talking to the people that she knows or has met before, and _all_ the in between.

Occasionally she introduces him, before jumping to the next task. It's a great attempt at hosting, but a pretty lousy attempt at relaxing, _in his opinion_.

He understands her need to keep going. _If you keep going and don't stop, then you don't have to deal._

The only problem is that watching that happen, in a person that you care about, is difficult. He wants to quash her pain, and eliminate her anguish. Maybe even witness her laugh a few times, in a memory of her Father.

He finds himself alone for a moment, in the kitchen. He spies a bottle of his favourite tipple waiting for him, separate from the main stock of drinks that the Catering staff have at their disposal. He smirks, knowing it's her doing, and pours himself a top up into a glass nearby, leaning against the counter.

"So…. _you're_ the famous Harvey Specter," A voice regards him, as he looks up to see a rather curvy blonde with a white and red dress scrutinising him. He stands to attention, until he spies the ring on her left hand, and then firmly relaxes.

 _The last thing he ever wants to do, is to get hit on by another woman at Donna's Father's wake._

"Perhaps," He says coolly, holding out a hand for her to introduce herself.

"Pepper Paulsen. Nice to finally meet you." She says, shaking his hand.

He double takes, smiling. "Wait? Pepper...as in _Pepper Potts_?"

"Oh…" She says, a note of interest in her voice. "So you're **a nerd** _and_ a lawyer." She regards, that genetic witt dragging through the family. "Interesting." She smirks. "And it's _Penelope_..." She explains. "My husband Peter, is wandering aimlessly." She adds. "I thought he was in here." She explains.

 _He's only half convinced of her reasoning._

"No Tony?" He smirks, his eyebrows raising as he takes in the information. " _Pete and Pepper Paulsen_?" He regards. "That is a bit much."

"Pete and Pepper Paulsen-Waite, I'll have you know. But, if you love that, then wait until you hear what _our kids_ are called…" She plays.

He wonders if she's joking, laughing anyway at the mere idea of such a thing.

"I noticed you were out on a limb here." She observes kindly. "Has Donna not introduced you to anyone yet?" She asks, inferring the crowd behind them.

"I know her Mother...and I've spoken to a couple of people," He defends.

"She's stressed out, isn't she?" She observes, looking behind herself as they both witness Donna ferreting around the room.

 _So omniscience really is a thing in this family? But somehow, strangely only for the women..._

"I think she's trying to keep herself busy…" He explains. "Personally, I'm trying to get her drunk, as she requested earlier." He notes.

"Wow... _bold_. I don't think Donna's ever been drunk in front of the family before." She says, thinking on the statement.

He frowns then.

 _The family oriented Donna doesn't quite seem to be the one that he's known all these years_.

He wonders if it's a combination of losing everything and striving to be more that changed her in this regard, or just the fact that she's never really been herself in the city. He can't seem to decide on either, at this point.

"Oh, she's _fun_ …" He assures the woman. "She gets the party going, that's for sure."

"Really?" The woman frowns. "I mean, don't get me wrong she's a comedienne, but never the life and soul of the party." She clarifies. "More a...witty addition."

"Donna is... ** _Donna_**. She's..."

"...she's what?"

"She's one of a kind, that's for sure." He says.

"I have a feeling that you know her better than we do?" Pepper infers, giving Harvey an interested look.

"We've spent, the last...decade, about twelve foot away from one another. So, if I don't know her by now, I never will." He tells the woman. Something catches him about his own words though.

 _Another piece to the puzzle._

"Well then...you might just be the perfect _Partner in Crime_ , for what I have in mind." She says.

"Yeah? _And what's that_?" He asks, smirking with a guardedness.

"We're gonna help her... _unwind a little_...within the socially acceptable bounds, of course."

"Believe, me if you know how... _I'll follow your lead_." He says. "She gave me free reign to plough her with alcohol, anyway."

"Okay then. That settles it," She says, beckoning him with a devilish smirk.

.

They find Donna talking with an older man, a strained look on her face as she nods repeatedly to a string of slowly drawn out sentences.

He feels Pepper beside him, leaning in conspiratorially. "That's Uncle Frank. He's like five hundred years old. I'll distract him, and you get her in the kitchen." She says, before sauntering over to the redhead and the man with liver spots and a worn in frown.

"Hey Cuz." He hears the woman say boldly. "Uncle Frank, I've been meaning to ask you…"

He slides against Donna's side, taking her hand and ignoring the strange look on her face at the two point plan as he escorts her out of the lounge.

" _What are you_ …" She starts, frowning boldly.

"You need a 'time out'…" He says to her face, before tugging her to move with him towards the kitchen.

She stops by the kitchen island, as several catering staff move past them, a look of reservation on her face. "Harvey... **I need to mingle**... _and host_." She explains. "It's my job."

"Donna, You've been hosting for two hours. I've not seen you eat or a drink _a thing_ , and the wake is going _fine_." He says. "Take a moment," He orders, handing her his glass.

She gives him a look, before taking a small sip, and handing it swiftly back to him.

He gives her a withering look, downing the rest of the contents of the glass.

"That all you got?" He goads, walking over to the counter, to pour another three fingers of whiskey.

"You realise I only drink that stuff because of _you_ , right?" She checks, pointing to him.

He gives her a look, before placing the glass down.

"Okay, what do you want? But it _has_ to be something you can take in a shot."

"Harvey," She says, her voice candid as she pointedly ignores the passing waiters. "I don't know if you've noticed, but this is my Father's funeral?"

"And _this morning_ , you told me to 'get you drunk'. _At the wake_. And right now you're wound tighter than Louis on his worst day." He observes.

"That...is bullshit." She says boldly.

"Seriously... _there's only two ways of getting you to relax right now, and only one of them is appropriate for a wak_ e." He says.

She arches an eyebrow then. "Well...it depends if just friends that throw their keys in, or if _Grandpa_ decides to join." She says with a sly wink.

"Uh...you're gross." He says, scrunching his face. His expression towards the point remains steady, though, as he watches her gradually give in. "So?"

"Fine...Tequila." She says, huffing.

" _Tequila it is_ …" He says. " _Stay right here_ ," He points to her feet, before gliding out of the room with a smirk.

He wanders up to the Bartenders - _if you can call them that_. _They're pretty much children behind a white table cloth in a dead man's lounge._ _He's sure all they know how to do is pour things out of bottles._ Hefocuses on the face of a youngish blonde guy.

"Hey, I need a bottle of Tequila, for the Hostess?" He says, opening his wallet and pulling out the two cleanest fifties that the kid has probably ever seen in his life, pointing them at the young man.

" _I don't know if_ …" The kid stutters, looking underneath the table for a moment.

"Come on kid, give it up." He encourages, watching as the young man's hand rises, handing over the bottle of Tequila with a worried face.

"No one will know it's gone, _trust me_." He says, taking the bottle and one glass, and looking about the various people spread out in the room.

 _This was **not** a Tequila crowd. _

He walks to the kitchen, watching her hands slide onto her hips and her head tilt, giving him a challenging look.

"That," She points. "Is _not_ a shot."

"I like to think this has more _potential_ than just a shot…" He remarks, a slight croon in his voice as he pours a double measure of the orangey liquid into a glass, before handing it to her, and doing the same with his own. He places the bottle next to the whiskey.

"To your Dad," He toasts.

"To Fathers." She adds, raising her own glass.

His smirk falters, before the genuine sentiment pools into his eyes. " _To Fathers_." he agrees, chinking their glasses. "You need to shot _that_ ," He reminds her, before downing his own, his expression turning sour at the bitter taste.

He's more occupied with _her lack_ of expression, as he sees her down the entire thing without so much as blinking.

"How do you do that?" He asks her.

"Easy...Tequila is _awesome_." She says, observing her empty glass as she licks her lips.

He smirks. "Whiskey's better." He counters.

"We're just...two different people, Harvey." She muses, playfully.

" _We're two sides of the same coin, and you_ _ **know**_ _it_ ," He counters, boldly. Her eyes flash with something, that he feels the need to cover instantly. "Time for another shot," He says, moving to the bottle.

She smirks at him, then, rolling her eyes at his insistence.

.

 _ **Donna Paulsen**_

The past week has been a strange one, to say the least .

 _Her Father had died._ Abruptly. Suddenly. Without real explanation - _An aneurism_ , apparently. Plain and simple.

And just like that, lost to the world.

She had only spoken to him the week previous. He had been fine. Chirpy. _Finally retired_. _Finally giving up the need to be Gordon Gekko_. Everything seemed to be settling in for him.

It was only then, that she _truly_ lost him.

And so she spent a week cleaning his house, and arranging his things, and living in a world that she'd barely stepped into.

There is another strangeness, too, _of Harvey_ , suddenly and inexplicably here, _with her_. Taking the weight of her duties and shouldering her burdens without so much as a complaint on his end.

She doesn't know what to do with that, in the wake of all of it put together.

He's holding her hand and comforting her, when no less than a week or two ago they had been spitting words in each other's faces and practically at each other's throats, to the point where their friends had to intervene, and draw up corners.

She'd even deleted his numbers from her phone. It had been an overstep, but a necessary one. She had been so angry, and so confused, and so heartbroken by his negative reaction to the kiss, that she had begun to finally and completely close the doors on him.

But now he's here, getting her drunk, and being kind and attentive, and displaying himself to her _entire_ family like her significant other. It _had_ caused her to fall in and out of trust with him over the course of the day. She was trying to move on. To establish herself as something outside of him, only for him to bring her back again. And it was only confusing matters the more he continued to be a Gentleman.

 _He is with Paula_. She doesn't understand it. She feels like she's missing pieces of the puzzle, and she wants to ask him questions, important, life altering ones, but the fact is, she's standing in the middle of burying her Father, and honoring his memory.

She just doesn't have time.

And so there is a push and a pull and a resistance, to this different Harvey, still attached to old problems, and yet serving up solutions for her in her fragile state.

He had held her, at the service, when she couldn't take it anymore. When her heart had faltered her, and her Mother hadn't even bothered to be in attendance.

He was there for her. _The only one, really._

Of course, Louis and Rachel and Mike had messaged, sending their love. But other than that, and when it comes down to it, she feels alone in the world, and yet all at once still silently attached to him. And for _not the first time_ , he is here, beside her and focused on her entirely in one wonderfully beguiling situation.

Because he's _still_ with Paula. She doesn't know everything, but she does know that.

She's slightly drunk now, after about an hour of Harvey very carefully topping up her drunken state. She's now witnessing her favourite cousin, Pepper, and Harvey in a battle of wits, as Peter looks at her with a humourous tiredness, the two fighting over the legislation of counterfeit law; something that Harvey is fully aware of in his line of work, and something that Pepper deals with in the day to day of her job as a _Global Security Investigations Manager_.

"Look, you can't base your entire ideology on the fact that the consumer is _deliberately_ _looking_ for a knock off," Pepper spouts, looking to Donna and her husband in disbelief, before eagerly immersing herself in her tirade against Harvey's counter argument. "A fake is still being produced to look like a direct copy, and that is a _strict_ violation." She adds.

She sighs, sliding a hand on both of the debaters. "Okay Brainiacs, I'm going to the bathroom." She says, chuckling to herself for a moment as she slides down the hall.

She notices someone at the door, frowning at who would possibly not have knocked. She doubles back, judging the noise level. Perhaps, it's a neighbour coming to pay their respects, someone that her Aunt had missed off of the list. She walks towards the doors, opening them, and walking out to see who it is.

"Donna,"

She hears the words come out of Mark Meadows' mouth, as he stands there, distinguished looking and looking at her like he's been looking for her _forever_.

"Mark?" She frowns.

"Sorry, I _know_ that I should have called," He admits, his soft eyes apologetic.

"Yes, you _should_ have." She corrects.

"It's just...I heard about your Dad from a colleague, and I...I'm just... _ **I'm so sorry**_." He tells her.

Her shoulders slump. The idea that he would be here, had fleeted in her mind when she had first arrived. He lived near Hartford, so there was always a possibility that she would run into him, after the last time.

Problem was, she didn't _want_ to run into him, _after the last time_. Not after what she had _almos_ t done. Not after the look on his face had haunted her for weeks.

He moves to wrap his arms around her. But it feels weird. It feels wrong, as she takes a step back, her arms rising to deter him.

"Mark... _you're married_." She points out.

" _We split up_." He counters.

"What?"

It knocks her, then, the information turning her entire life on it's head.

"You were right, what you said." He tells her. "And I realised, I... _I couldn't stay_...in a relationship with someone when I was still thinking about _**you**_ like that, I... _it's always been you_ , Donna." He tells her, breathless and a raw yearning in his voice.

"Mark," She manages, her head full of feelings but no words left now.

"I came here to pay my respects, but _I_ just…I love you, Donna" He pauses, his hands sliding to her face then, his lips descending on hers.

" **Donna,** _ **what's**_ -"

His distinct voice is like a bucket of ice water to the face, as she rips herself away from the wonderful man with his heart laid out in front of her, her lips moist and her heart beating loudly to witness two sharp cheekbones, and an shocked gaze, as Harvey's quick deduction of the situation in front of him percolates into his face.

His back hunches, almost like a dog, as his steely eyes look directly at a man he recognises immediately.

"Harvey...I just...can you give me a minute?" She asks, searching his suddenly locked down expression.

" _Donna_ ," He questions, heavily, his head shaking slowly against her words.

" _Please_." She pleads, her eyes boring into hers.

It takes him a second, before he backs away, flashing his gaze at the man one last time before going back inside.

Her heart bends a fraction, the worry that he'll suddenly leave confusing itself with the man that's stood in front of her.

She looks back at Mark, noticing his expression change as well. "So... _ **he's here**_ …" He says, nodding to himself, a the irony of the moment.

"Mark...you don't call me? You don't text? _This is my Father's funeral_. This is _a lot_ …"

"Are you...together? _You and Harvey_?" He fires at her. _It's the first time in all the time that she's known him, that he sounds just like Harvey_.

She gives him a withering look. _She is so tired of both of these men right now_. "No, Mark, **he** , _like you_ , decided to be with someone else rather than be with me." She snaps at him.

"Donna, look, I know what I asked you, was lousy, I get that…I do...but I'm _here_ now." He says, planting the words. She doesn't answer, and so a thought seems to catch at his eyes. "Wait...Don't tell me that after all this time, you're _**still**_ holding out for him?" He supposes.

"Mark..I kissed him. _Okay?_ I kissed him...whilst he was in a relationship, and the only reason _I did that_ was because of _you_. Because I thought, that if I wasn't meant to be with the guy from the _best relationship of my life_ , then I needed to see if _he_ was _**the love of my life**_." She says. "And the difference is, Harvey has been _the perfect gentleman_ , and has been here for me _all day_ , _**as a friend**_ , even though I know that he fought with my Father every single time he met him. And unlike _you_ , he didn't ask me to have an affair with him behind his wife's back. If anything...he's only here because he's being a friend to me." She says. "Because he's been there. _For everything_." She tells him. "And if I was holding out for him...then it would be because of _that_." She says staunchly.

"I…" He pauses, his face devoid of argument.

"Mark." She says. "I _still_ love you. I always will. But I can't deal with this right now. I need to mourn my Father, and then figure out some things. So...I need you..to go home...and just give me...a few days. And then I'll call you. Okay?." She reasons.

" _Will you_?" He asks her, a doubt hanging in his face.

"Yes." She nods, her hand sliding over his beard. "I will."

He seems pained, and live-wired like she's never seen. She wagers that the break up is morning coffee fresh, and that he's out of sorts right now. But her words seem to settle him somewhat, despite that. He leans in, his hand sliding into her hair, as he kisses her cheek, his lips lingering long enough to tell her that he has _her_ in mind.

"Goodnight Donna," He tells her.

"Goodnight Mark." She says, before turning on her heel and walking to the door.

She's not going to wait for him to leave. If she does, she doubts he'd ever leave.

When she walks back into the house, people are starting to make their way out, so she doesn't even have time to find _him_.

Her life is a mess. And entire shit storm of a mess.

.

It takes half an hour to say goodbye to people. Thankfully her Mother had left pretty early into the wake, but it left her to be the one to give her thanks to the various friends and family for their attendance, in honoring her Father's passing.

She pays the Caterer, and the Bar staff, who disassemble their equipment quickly, and strip themselves from her Father's house.

She wonders if Harvey has left, until she spies his car still out front still. It brings her some relief, that he's not left yet.

But when she walks upstairs, he's not in the guest room. If she were honest with herself, she is too emotionally exhausted after everything, to even assemble herself enough to battle Harvey's reaction to Mark turning up out of the blue. To have him make up his own story to the outcome of his appearance. Especially after the things that she had said the night before.

So, she walks to her father's ensuite, and turns on the shower, the place where she's sure she can rid herself of the gambit of conflicting emotions that are streaking right through her.

.

If walls could whisper  
They would whisper to me  
"We'll keep you sheltered my dear, but we can't set you free"  
So dance with your demons and television lines  
And if you must tell her  
Then you better tell her tonight

And whilst you were sleeping  
I sat in the dark  
With all my offenses  
The creases on my heart  
And all these bad feelings  
From my teenage boy brain  
And for all of my offenses

I will count the grains of salt  
For all the lies I told

' ** _Salt_** ' By Jordan Mckampna


	4. Chapter 4

_Author's Notes: I rookie'd this, and forgot to Beta. It's done now. *Rated M* From this point on._

 _._

 ** _Chapter 4 -_**

.

Harvey had spent over an hour, sat, outside a literal stranger's house, with a bottle of quickly emptying Whiskey.

It turns out, that Donna Paulsen was the only thing that remained through the numbing of alcohol. _Either that_ , or he truly had become an alcoholic, over the years.

She had mentioned Mark the night before. It was almost as if the stars themselves were hell bent on making his life a complicated shit-fight. He had to turned up unannounced. They both had. So, of course _he_ would. It was only fitting, considering Paula, and the kiss, and her Father dieing, and everything else going on with them.

Now add to that, the sudden and innate feeling of fear. _This wasn't just about him figuring out if he wanted to be with Donna instead of Paula_. _If he wanted to forever alter their position in one another's lives._ This was _now_ about the possibility of losing her to a man that he'd nearly lost her to a decade ago. A man that still wanted her. Of that he was sure.

He wasn't going to pretend that he wasn't happy when Mark Meadows, _the perfect boyfriend_ , had let her go. He always knew, deep down that whenever she became happy with someone else, it meant that he would struggle between the happiness he wanted for her, and the innate feeling of losing her.

 _And that feeling of losing her_ , added with his immense effort to abate such an outcome, won _every single time_. He was a selfish asshole when it came to her. _He was_. He knew it in his bones.

And after seeing her kissing a man that wasn't him, he feels like he should have left immediately after. But for the first time, he is rooted to the spot. He is virtually incapable of leaving, until he hears a confirmation from her, to support her actions.

The thought of such a thing terrifies him.

And so... _here he is_...an adult...with his own law firm...house...car... _hiding, out back_ , with a bottle of Scotch.

In the yard of a man who's not here anymore…

He shakes his head at such a notion, pulling the bottle to his lips, where the glass had been discarded long before.

He frowns, the liquid tasting like water, and the sensation feeling as such.

He had heard everyone leave about twenty minutes ago, the catering staff passing him through the back door with their held expressions.

He hears the shower turn on then, a light flick above him and knows that the gathering must be over by now.

 _Either that or the woman he's potentially in love with, has just had the best sex of her life, and is now celebrating that with a good long shower._

He takes another swig of Macallan, swilling it about his mouth.

 _Time to do another stupid thing,_ he thinks to himself, as he moves to stand, pulling at his shoulder slightly for the position it's set into, and picking up the coat that he had shrugged off earlier.

.

He wanders up to his room, the idea of a shower not a bad idea, as he walks to the en suite, quickly discarding his clothes. He figures that the act might give him some clarity, as the water washes over him with a raised temperature that he suspects is caused by two showers being run at the same time. But there is something calming about the heat of it, just below unbearable, as he closes his eyes and lets the water take him.

 _He uses the time to gear himself up. To take a chance._

.

He finds her on her Father's bed, dressed in black leggings, a camisole and a her cardigan hung around her delicate form, staring out at the acres of dimming light, that spread out into the promise of a clear winter night sky. Her head inclines slightly, feeling him behind her, as he wanders very slowly towards her.

"Harvey," She says, adjusting her expression. "I thought you'd left." She admits.

"I thought about it...after seeing you kiss your ex-boyfriend." He says, his surly demeanour getting the best of him.

"Ugh, he kissed me, _actually_." she says. "And... _you're with Paula_. So what does it matter to you?"

"Donna,"

"No, seriously." She says, in urge awakening in her, then. "Why are you here, Harvey?"

"Because you needed me." He says plainly.

"Clearly, judging by today, _yes_... _I needed someone_. But I never asked you to come here." She clarifies.

"Look, Donna" He says, wrestling with his frustration at her. "I wanted to be there for you. And Paula said I needed to figure things out _with us_ , and...she's right, I do, guess I just-."

"I'm sorry, wait," She says, a sharpness in her words as she interrupts him. " _ **You're ONLY here**_ because _your girlfriend_ told you to figure things out with me?" She gives him a stony look. "You are... _unbelievable_. Do you do _anything_ without the aid or either her... _or me_?" She fires at him.

"Donna, I'm here because I want to be. And I told her that I was coming here, before she even had a chance to comment on it. _Only then_ , did she give me the permission to...work it out. Because she knows, that what's going on between us _isn't_ over. And you know it too. Regardless of my girlfriend, or your ex boyfriends, or...what you had to do today."

"Harvey, don't you get it?" She says bitterly, a laugh escaping her that borders on insolence. "If you don't know how you feel about me now, then you'll never figure it out."

"You don't know that."

" _Mark knows_."

"Donna,"

"No, I'm serious, Harvey." She says. "I'm not saying it to rile you, but he split up with his wife. _He apologised_ , for wanting me on the side, and he wants to _be_ with _me_."

"Donna, that guy is on the rebound. He's gonna hurt you," He warns then, his face charting the truth of his words.

"And yet, he's told me more, about how he feels about me, in the last hour, than you have in the last thirteen years!" She says.

He clenches his fist, feeling his chest tighten.

"Donna…I know...that...I wanted to hold your hand when I saw you were gonna lose it today." He says. "And I've wanted to put my arms around you, just to bring you comfort for what I know is the _hardest thing_ a person can do their life." He tells her. "And I've wanted to kiss you for about a week, now. But you won't...let me... _do_ any of that." He tells her. "And yet, **you let** _ **him**_."

"Because you're still with Paula, Harvey! And I can't be your charity case any longer!"

"Donna, you have never been, _**nor will you**_ _ **ever be**_ my 'charity case'." He frowns. _He hates that she thinks so little of him_. Of them. "Look...I know I was angry with you. **_I was._ **And I know that we've been in a weird place lately...but after you kissed me...it's changed things, Donna. _It changed_ _us_ _._ And believe me, I've been trying to figure out why is has, _this entire time_ ….but...we're not gonna figure it out if you don't _at least_ let me try."

"Maybe I think that you should know how you feel about me, without having to put me _through_ all of that." She counters.

"Why? You kissed me, to figure out how _you_ felt, when I was with Paula. Why do I have to be any different…?"

" _I kissed you_ , to see if you'd kiss me back, Harvey. _And you didn't_ …" She defends.

"Actually, **I did**. But you pulled away, and I was in shock, that the most important woman _**in my life,**_ who had shut down the idea of us _over a decade ago_ , was suddenly kissing me, and _not like brother, or cousin, but like a woman that I hadn't so much as touched since I was a rookie Associate_. And she chose the _one_ moment, above _all_ the others that we've had, to do it when I was _in a relationship with someone else_." He pauses, whipping a breath into his lungs. "And then, _I come here_ , to support you, and to figure it all out, and you're...kissing your ex!"

" _ **He**_ kissed _me_ , Harvey." She tells him. "And as for kissing you...I told you...I didn't want to _not_ know how I felt about you, before I lost you."

"Donna... _you can't ever lose me_. I told you that once before. _**It's different...with you.**_ _It always has been, and it probably always will be."_ Those words haven't changed their meaning in over two years. It should tell him enough, but he still needs more assurances. "Now...we need to figure this out. Because I put you in a box _a long time ago_. Because _you_ told me to, and I respected that. But _now I_ …"

"What if I don't want to be part of your 'grand experiment', Harvey. On the the day of my father's funeral?"

"I'm not saying you have to be. But we need to figure this out."

She sighs heavily, her eyes bending to avoid his gaze as she processes every words.

"What if...this.. _isn't meant to be more than it is_?" She offers, her face bending with the possibility of such a thing.

"Then.. _we've...had a great run_. And maybe it'll establish where we stand in eachother's lives. And Mark Meadows is _clearly holding a candle for you_." He says, with more of an edge to his voice than he'd meant.

"Harvey," She warns, giving him a look.

"Donna...if we're _not_ meant to be together, then don't you think it's time we know either way? For both our sakes?"

She thinks on his words, slumping onto the edge of the bed.

"I guess you're right." She sighs, the truth laying out between them.

"I know you're scared, Donna." He offers, sitting beside her. "I'm scared too."

"Then why do you seem like the calmer one?" She accuses, a smile bending into her fresh face.

" _Because your Father just died_." He explains softly, his hand sliding to the middle of her back. "And I didn't come here to have it all be about me."

She's sighs, the feeling of his strong hand sliding up and down the middle of her back in smooth waves. She takes in a deep breath, her shoulders evening out.

" _That's what I told Mark_ …" She manages, concentrating the feeling of his hand on her.

"What?" He mumbles, frowning.

"That _you_...didn't come here, and kiss me in flurry. You've just... _been there_...for _me_. All day, no questions asked...you've been a friend to me."

"Just a friend?" He offers, his expression guarded against the gambit of emotions splaying in his gut at all of her of possible answers to his question.

"Harvey. A friend was _all_ I needed today." She says.

He nods thoughtfully, his lips twitching into a pout as his hand stills on her back.

"...that feels good..." She mutters, her eyebrows twitching at the fact.

"Good." He says, a playfulness in his tone as his hand starts to move again, sensing the encouragement in her voice. He watches her blonde lashes flutter closed for a moment, her exhale seeming to rid her of some of the day's difficulties.

" _I'm sorry about your Dad_." He tells her then.

 _He's wanted to tell her all day. But something stopped him. Maybe it was the fact that he didn't want to remind her. Didn't want to keep bringing it up._

 _But he needs her to know..._

Her eyes open then, regarding the look in his eyes.

He feels like they've moved back two years, except with the final missing piece of the puzzle.

"You realise, if we're going to figure this out...it's gonna be because you kiss me, and not because I kiss you." She offers, matter of factly.

He gives her a look then, his hand dropping. _She's impossible_. "You said you didn't want to be part of my 'grand experiment' today. And you were pissed at Mark for kissing you." He remarks, an irk framing his voice. "I was trying to honor that. He defends, limply.

She chuckles then. "I'm starting to realise that you're far too honorable, when it comes to me." She accuses softly, her face leaning in a touch.

"I'm starting to realise, that you run _in the opposite direction_ when you think you feel something for me." He says.

Her mouth hangs open, a restrained sound falling out of it, as she points at him, an objection hanging in her eyes. " _We've both done that_ …" She reminds him.

 _She's right. Maybe she's right._

He shuffles along the bed then, watching the comical look disappear from her face as she looks into his eyes.

"I'm sorry that I ran to Paula...when I should have given you time to figure things out." He says, planting every word. "I was scared...that you didn't want more."

"I'm sorry...that I never told you what 'more' could be...I didn't want to admit it to myself. I could have prevented...all of this, I guess." She says. "I just...if you love her, Harvey... _please_. Just let me go."

"I can't. I…" He struggles, the words thick in his mouth. "I can't do that." He tells her.

"Why not, Harvey?"

" _You_ _ **know**_ _why._ "

 _She shakes her head, and the disappointed look on her face, the last he ever wants to see, that is enough to completely destroy all the walls he's ever built around them._

He grabs her face in his hands, bending down to press his lips against hers. He feels his own breath catch, as his lips push hers apart, his tongue sliding into her warm mouth as one hand drops and he shuffles along the bed, closer towards her. _She tastes like toothpaste and smells like oranges_ , he thinks, as their bodies press together, and she elicits a slight moan. It's like an orange flare right into his night sky, _that sound_ , as his hands slide to her waist, pressing around her hips as he becomes immersed in the act of her kissing him back, her mouth sucking at his top lip, her fingers digging into the cotton of his grey t-shirt with a repressed need suddenly broken open like an easter egg.

All at once, his nipples feel hard, and his skin feels like it's going to light on fire in his groin as his hands press her as close to him _as them sitting side by side will allow_. She seems to sense the frustration in him, as she slides onto his lap, causing him groan in satisfaction at her second guessing him, his mouth hungrily sucking at hers with a need to keep their connection the same as he leans back, allowing her weight to brace him. _Kissing a beautiful woman is different when you're not wearing a suit._ In a suit, it's all restriction and a slightly masochistic order of things, where you spend more time enjoying the various stages until you can comfortably reach an end game. _Sometimes you make it work, without getting undressed at all._ But he's always been a fan of a more _sensual_ experience. And in slacks and a t-shirt...it's all too easy to skip to the end, as he feels his burgeoning erection start to rise against the underside of her thigh as she rocks gently towards his hips.

She slides off her cardigan, as he hears it drop to the floor with a thud. He opens his eyes or a moment, taking in the fact that _it's her_ , _**and only her**_ , with her slightly wet red hair rippling over one shoulder and her breasts, caught loose and defined underneath her tight shirt. He holds her head, dipping it to meet his so that he can kiss her fully on the mouth, before his lips slide against her collarbone, his hands pressing down her back to receive the closeness that he's so desperate for.

"Harvey," She gasps, feeling his need twitch along the inside of her right thigh, as her hands rake through his still wet hair, her head falling backwards as he sucks at the skin of her flesh. She feels him pause, his hands grabbing at the edges of her top, only to pull it up and over her chest. She heaves a breath, their fingers meeting in the middle, as she throws the material onto the ground, her hair falling behind her back in the process as her hands find his face, tilting it towards him to suck at his charmingly crooked and wholly inviting mouth, before her hands scratch down his back, and she encourages him to rid himself of his own layer of clothing.

He presses them together then, kissing her sternum, before his head tilts, sucking a nipple into his mouth as his hand cups the other breast.

"Oh, _fuck_ ," She breathes, her hand kneading the nape of his neck, as he moves his mouth to her other breast. She arches away from him, as he groans again, the feeling of his erection becoming uncomfortable then.

He kisses the valley between her breasts, before his hands slide under her legging covered thighs and lifts her, allowing him to sit backwards. She's rather light for a tall woman, as he drags them both so that they are in the middle of the bed. She notices the change in pace, as she moves off of him, and for a second he frowns at her, before he stretches over her, his lips contacting hers and his fingers sliding in between her own. He raises them above her head as his lips slip to her neck, nipping at the flesh there and then to her shoulder, before sucking at the valley between her breasts once more, and sliding his tongue out of his mouth, to trail it down her stomach, all the way to the waistband of her leggings.

He lets go of her hands then, as his own wrap around the waistband to kiss every piece of her that he exposes, as he peels them off. His delighted to find that she's forgone wearing underwear to bed - _just one layer too many for him_ \- and pulls the leggings off of each foot, discarding them onto the floor with all their other clothing.

He pauses, looking at her, as she raises an eyebrow, and like that, they are transported back to the other time. _The only other time for them_. _He had been just as eager back then_ , he thinks, as he starts at one ankle, and peppers kisses all the way up the calf of each leg until he reaches a thigh. His groin is aching for him to release the tension, but his internal excitement has not been this potent in so long, that he's adamant that he'll take his time.

 _He doesn't want to think, right now. He just wants to enjoy her._

He watches as she spreads her legs for him, and he feels the impulse to fuck her then and there and forego the foreplay, until he has another flash of the past come to haunt his memories, and he grasps her hips, his mouth sliding against the few blonde curls that she has. He feels her buck against him, a vowel or two flying out of her mouth, as he works a rhythm with his tongue and lips and teeth right against _that_ spot.

Her hands slide across either side of his head, _as she moans_ , and chases his actions, her pelvis tilting against the firm muscular action of his tongue. He remembers the sounds she made, _over a decade ago_ , and yet they are exactly the same. For a second he loses focus, as the realisation dawns on him, _that she's always been like this for him. It's never waned in her, and all this time he thought it was lost between them. That they could never get back what they had, so why fight trying to get back there when they had everything anyway?_ _ **He was a fool, and never so much as in this moment. He was a fool for being in love with her all this time.**_ _For wasting them, when he should have fought._

 _Just like she had told him long ago._

He flicks his attention back into the room at the sound of her voice, thready, and yet falling into a guttural wave of sound.

"H-H-Harvey...harder…" She pants, riding her orgasm, as it intensifies, when he slides two fingers into her. She whimpers, and curses him in the same sentence, and the feeling of her being completely wet and moaning his name out into the air around them, is enough to bring him back. He sucks one last time, just to make sure as she stiffens against him, crying out something strangled and at odds with her being, that she's reached the pinnacle. He smirks in victory, before his own need cries out in his head and he climbs on top of her, one hand sliding around her ribcage, and the other, helping him enter her. He groans, loudly, the tight wetness contracting around him in an instant as he thrusts shallowly, before leaning forward to place a sloppy kiss against her lips that has her arching to kiss him back. She lets go when he thrusts fully into her, a puff of air escaping her at the action, as his hands slide around her hips to gain better purchase. They weren't this pedestrian the last time, but all at once just wants the closeness; to look at her, square in the eye as he fucks her. _For there to be no daylight between the sensation that being inside her is giving him, and have him witness their complete undoing_. Her hands rake down his stomach, before landing on his shoulders, as he manages to enter her more fully now, having her contract tightly around him in a rhythm that spurs him on.

His eyes finds hers, her flushed cheeks and greeny-hazel eyes showing him that look of lust on her face as he frowns slightly, the pressure starting to build within him.

"Donna," He moans, his breath coming in threads.

She groans at the sound of her own name, causing him to lean closer towards her, and burying himself deeper inside her as her hands fold over his shoulders to encourage the action.

She leans upwards, fusing their mouths together in a hot and sensual kiss that has him thrusting out of rhythm, as he pulls out of her for a second. She looks up at him, smirking through a moan, and he shakes his head, entering her with more force.

"Harvey," She cries out, whimpering then, her fingers digging into the smooth flesh of his arms, as he reaches a faster pace, the sensation within him coming in the most intense waves he thinks he's ever felt in his life. The electric pressure builds in his groin, as his lips finds hers, one more time before his hips jerk, and he empties fully into her as she groans, riding his orgasm against her own.

He is panting heavily and she is thoroughly soaked, and they've just made love - _he thinks_ \- on her late Father's bed.

He remains within her, half too scared to ruin the quilt further by pulling out, and half revelling in the feeling of being inside a woman he's been avoiding thinking about for _far too long_.

He leans against her, their bodies slick and close as he bends down, kissing her soundly, if not a little lazily in their post coital haze.

She kisses him back, her lips swollen, as her hands slide across his face. They remain like that for a moment, living in some strange truth as their eyes connect.

He wants to say it, but he's afraid.

 _Of tomorrow. Of the next day._

He pulls out of her, in realising that they're not even really in bed, and rolls off of her, to lay on his back to that they are side by side.

"So…" He says, still catching his breath.

"So…" She adds. "That felt like...before."

"I thought it was.. _better_." He counters.

"You did?" She says.

He nods, before looking at the ceiling, and thinking on the moment, as they lay there, completely naked on a ruined bedspread, with the light still on, and probably with her Father watching over, somewhere in the distance. _Or at the very least, neighbours in the house next door..._

He watches her get up, her pert ass wandering to the bathroom.

He looks about himself, suddenly feeling cold and tired and slightly drunk, still, as he picks up his slacks, pulling them on. He hears the toilet flush, as he sits on the bed. When she reenters the bedroom, he frowns instantly, witnessing a towel, covering her body.

"What is that?" He asks.

"What? It's weird...the light is on..." She excuses. "And you're not exactly _naked_."

He sits up, beckoning her. "Come here."

She regards him for a moment, a sudden unease flashing on her face.

"Please?" He asks.

Her chin lifts, reticence there as she pads over to him.

He leans forward, pulling her by the arm with a tug so that she drops into his lap.

She smiles lazily, her hands sliding onto his shoulders, as he tilts his head, pressing their lips together.

"Hey…" He says, breaking them apart. "I need to say something...and I just... _I know there's a lot going on_ , but I...I just need to... _get it out_."

"Okay," She nods, her face suddenly unreadable.

"When we get back to the city... _after I've spoken to Paula_...I would like to...take some time with you. _Just us_. And explore...this _thing_ between us."

"Harvey...I'm not gonna be your bit on the side." She says, giving him a heavy look.

"That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying...just us. Two...single people."

Her eyes widen, as she takes in the insinuation, made plain for her slightly _blonde_ _moment_.

"Oh…" She says, her body softening against him. He watches as she looks down, processing his words.

"I know, you have Mark to think about," He adds, a slight doubt in his words.

"No. I...need to talk to him...but...that's not...at forefront of my mind, right now." She says, her own nuance for him.

He relaxes then. "How about we sleep in the guest bedroom tonight?"

"I think that's a...great idea," She muses, as she climbs off of him, picking up her leggings and her camisole, and holding them against her as she walks.

"You're not actually getting dressed, are you?" He accuses, following her with a confident smirk as he flicks off the light in the room, before exiting.

When he reaches the guest room, she gives him a look, the unevenness of his proposal flashing in her mind. "We're either both dressed, or both naked." She lays the words like a gauntlet.

He smiles widely, sliding his slacks off then. "Naked it is."

She rolls her eyes, tutting just to offset her growing smile, as she lets her clothes _and towel_ drop to the floor.

He follows her to the bed, watching as she pulls back the covers, and slides a hand around her waist, before she can lower herself, kissing her soundly as he presses her against him.

He could go for a second time. _But he wagers that she's had a very stressful day. All things considered._

She pulls them apart, her hazel eyes glistening with emotions that they've never admitted to one another before, as he lowers her onto the bed, kissing her once more, before moving to flick off the light off. As the darkness envelopes them, he slides smoothly into bed next to her.

 _They lay, entangled in one another the entire night. Her hair across his arm, and his arm around her stomach. It's a wholly impractical position, but exactly what they both need it to be._

 _They both sleep through the night._

 _Their relationship forever altered._

.

 ** _The morning sun is etched in violent pink and candied orange clouds, as he looks over at her, in casual dress, scrolling through her messages, the wind in her fire-lit hair, as it blows against the framework of the windows that are rolled down on each side. As he drives them through the growing highrises of the beckoning city that they both have a love affair with, he smiles quietly to himself, thinking just how perfect she looks beside him. _**

**_She looks to him then, smirking at the way the shadows catch at the plains of his face, and an intensity draws from within him. How he seems so classic an image, whilst all at once feeling like the rise and fall of the tide. She is like a fisherman, happily lost at sea, in between the waves of his love for her._**

 ** _It is all encompassing. But nothing less than she imagined it would be._**

 _._

 _A_

 _Sorry about the Beta'ing. It should be fine now. When Prompts run wild!_


End file.
